Sorry if I was unclear--the fax is coming the other direction. They sign (physically) and fax back to us, where we sign, digitally. We can provide that back to them on disk, via FTP, or e-mail, or a host of other ways--but we're NOT trying to fax a digital signature at any point of the process.
I fully intend to have our lawyers go over this; however, I want to have a complete process to pitch at them so they can review the whole thing. If I talk to them before I have the technologies and processes lined up, they won't really be able to evaluate it properly--I could end up putting something into it later that might invalidate what they thought was kosher. So, you're right, I haven't talked to them yet--but that WILL be happening before the system goes live--just after I work out what the system is.
This is exactly what I'm not looking for--I've already dredged up all kinds of theoretical discussion of digital signatures, for and against. I want some practical advice.
Hmm... well, I suppose, but I've already got 90% of what I think I need for the system. We've had fax software for ages, and there are completely free PGP variants I can download for signing. I hate to drop coin on a huge Notes installation project, throwing the company into transition turmoil in the process, and see my break-even point in cost-benefit race away into the future.
If this were from scratch, in a completely non-wired company with no existing infrastructure, that may well be an excellent option. But I want to leverage what I have already, or it starts to not really be worth it.
It's going to be a requirement. We're in a position where we can dictate something of the sort; we already require them to check scheduling via our website, so they all have some sort of PC to work on. Additionally, provided I go with PGP or something similar, the software they will need to authenticate the signatures is free and I should be able to provide a simple guide to set it up properly.
I'm actually more worried about the larger companies we deal with (GE and the like). They are the most technologically advanced, but also the most entrenched and the least likely to bargain with us.
From my perspective, when hiring, it depends on the job. Am I going to find a programmer who is 'over-qualified' for a position? No, probably not--whatever experience they have that is over and above the requirements is cool, as long as they're willing to work the position for the pay that's offered.
But there are positions where I really want just a total drone, too--the ones where if the employee starts thinking too much, it just causes trouble. I don't need a junior level tech support guy trying to re-engineer my network. If he used to be a senior sysadmin, that's almost certainly what's going to happen. This is IT--there is no one right way to do anything. Watch/. for some great examples of people vehemently arguing over completely trivial optimizations or techniques or tools. Fine for a discussion board; not something I want happening in my IT department between a sysadmin and a junior assistant underling phone monkey who used to be a sysadmin.
Good point--these are not mutually exclusive things. I worked my way through college doing part-time sysadmin work; when I got out, I not only had the degree but four years of real-world experience to put on my resume.
It's not always easy to find places where you can work at the flexible sort of hours required for pulling down a full course load, but it's worth looking for. Large companies with night shifts, small ones that are flexible... there are options. A big selling point I found for getting companies to allow me to work off-hours was "But it's better if I do this stuff when it won't disrupt the users, anyway."
Yeah... you don't want to be a sysadmin, anyway, if you're well-adjusted and normal.
If you're not, well, it's not something they can teach you in school, but you'll get a chance to read up on Machiavelli and other cool medieval sysadmins, so it's worth it for that if nothing else.
Well, most places, Code Three indicates an emergency response... real fast, lights and sirens, the adrenaline pumping stuff. The way he was using it didn't seem consistent, I guess... you might say "Say, dispatcher, there seems to be a green gentleman with a rocket powered flying machine in Times Square terrorizing the populace, would you be so good as to respond additional units Code Three?" but simply yelling it into the radio doesn't mean much.
As far as 'official' ten codes go, it doesn't seem to me that many agencies use them (at least out West). He could have meant 10-33, though, which simply means 'emergency' or perhaps he was off a number and meant 10-34, 'riot'. Shortly thereafter, he would likely have had a 10-7, 'out of service' (often used to call for bathroom breaks--inadvertent in this case).
I didn't say they were targetting rocks, just hitting them, and I said it because A: it was a colorful metaphor and B: because (and I'm surprised this has escaped your notice, given your obvious bias) they make mistakes. And there is a difference between dispersed targets (a lot of guys in caves) and clustered targets (a lot of guys in urban areas). And I won't even go into the different types of bombs and bombing that might be used and how that affects casualty rates, since you don't seem very interested in hearing anything that doesn't reinforce your own view of the situation.
Your assertion about Afghanistan and the press is misplaced; specifically, it should be placed in Kuwait/Iraq and moved back about ten years. There haven't been any significant restrictions on press movement in Afghanistan since this thing started, and if you leaf back through the various articles covering the last several months you would see that--all those reporters getting killed by bandits, wearing burqas to blend in to the populace, and generally spending more time filing articles about their personal safety and not about the battles--they are not there under control of anyone's military. Some of them were there before there was any real military presence. Their lack of freedom has more to do with cultural issues than any sort of control problem. I would suggest that you're so caught up in your agenda that you're taking the conditions of Kosovo and the Gulf War and imposing them here to stoke your somewhat weak arguments. However, I'm not interested in discussing the conspiracy theory of the week--I think this study, the numbers, and the implications, are intriguing, and are so without dragging any tired old over-simplified, anti-American diatribes into it. I have no interest in defending the American military's mistakes, but they just don't have anything to do with what this conversation was originally about. If you can't even be bothered to address the basic thesis (even matches=more casualties) then this is just a waste of bandwidth. Thanks for your time anyway.
Sure; not trying to say no one died, just hypothesizing that it would have been more had it been a more even match. I think you're way off on your numbers as far as equating months of bombardment with certain amounts of casualties. It has a lot more to do with targets, tonnage, and rules of engagement. If they're hitting cities (like in Iraq) I would expect it would be higher, mostly rocks (like Afghanistan) a lot lower. And the reason we don't know, of course, has much more to do with lack of a free press there than here. If you're expecting some guy speculating from the anchor desk of ABC to give you good numbers on something happening half a world away that he can't see, of course you're not going to get accuracy--which is not to say he can't make up any numbers he'd like, high or low, which sounds pretty free to me.:)
I think he's going on war being a lose/lose proposition. Why have two different magnitudes for the sides when all the dead people are... well, all dead? Total effect on humankind, or something of that sort.
Regardless, on a hunch I would say that tremendously one-sided wars are probably lower magnitude than when the sides are evenly matched. Nothing causes casualties like a slugfest where neither side is backing down. Armies that break quickly and surrender take fewer casualties than those that stand and fight it out (excepting ethnic or religious conflicts).
I'll second your recommendation of that book--I bought it on vacation at White Sands and spent most of the rest of the trip completely absorbed in it. Fascinating account of the science and the social interaction that lead up to Trinity.
Yeah, but with half a brain it's easy to make it look like a regular screw-up, or something that came from outside, or was just plain someone else's fault. IT workers do have a tremendous amount of power over many businesses today, and few people on either side really seem to realize it. It's worth keeping them happy, or at least not screwing them over.
I often take out a little 'insurance' if the people I am working for make me uncomfortable at all. Never done anything so far, but if someone tried to hose me badly (for example, most recently I was worried about getting canned right before annual bonuses came out--which I had stupidly agreed to count toward my desired base salary; didn't happen, fortunately, but would have been an easy way for them to get a year's worth of cheap work out of me) I wouldn't feel much compunction about returning the favor. In a world where the people with the most money hold most of the cards, I don't see a problem with using what I do hold to stay in the game.
Perhaps you just think it's coincidence that a new mayor is elected from West Seattle and all of a sudden this system goes in? Oh, no, my friend... strings have been pulled.
That Thriftway isn't even the good one--Admiral Thriftway, further North along California, would have been a much better choice. I would gain hours of my life back as if I didn't have to wait in line behind hordes of Yuppies paying for a bottle of Perrier with their debit/credit card in the 'express checkout' lane, fumbling with their PIN, receipts, etc. I suppose that using regular ol' dollar bills like the commoners would sully them horribly, but perhaps they could be trained to use this finger scanner system.
I think your definition of 'core functionality' is a little weak... this uninstalls a chunk of adware installed alongside the app, not a hunk of the code, does it not? Tell me this--does the app continue to do what it says it will do after Adaware screens it? I would guess that it does--most do, otherwise people wouldn't bother to run Adaware--no point if it actually disabled the functionality they got the app for in the first place. Your example with the TCP/IP stack binding to the adware app is presented as just that--an example. Is this something you do, or not? Are you just inventing examples to avoid the real point? And if the user doesn't need that, why would you think it is a 'core' function?
I can understand you're feeling a little emotional at the moment, but unfortunately it seems to have gotten the better of you and you're reacting to what you thought I said instead of what I actually said. I never said the app performed illegally--I said the legality of the click-to-agree EULA was questionable. When you say "Check the law!" it makes it very clear that you have not done so--there is good reason to doubt this sort of EULA will hold up in court. It's not illegal, it just may not be legally binding. See Softman vs. Adobe--different circumstances, but it has some implications for your naive assertions that anything stuffed in an EULA is binding.
My suggestion would be that if the pristine state of the box your code runs on is so important to you, that you simply not release it. The fact that you have authored something just plain doesn't give you unlimited authority to dictate when and how and where and with what people use it. It's a common misconception, from corporate America on down, but it's just not true--consumers have rights, and you can't simply disregard them because they don't suit you. Unless, of course, you have Congress in your pocket.;)
I would say it's unethical unless there is some valid, technical reason why your program would not perform its core function properly while the other piece of software is installed. Ethically, you don't have any reason to meddle with what the user chooses to have or not have installed on his or her computer; it's simply none of your affair. If you have some political reason to not want Adaware on people's systems, fine--but that does not mean it's ethical to remove it, even if you are prompting the user. It may be ethical to simply refuse your own install unless the other piece of software is removed, but I think initiating the un-install for the other product is probably not kosher unless for valid technical reasons.
Legally is a different matter; there are plenty of things that are legal but unethical (heck, lawyers in general... nevermind) but I think the legality of this is questionable at the very least. 'Click to agree' EULAs are questionable in the first place, even before you add language to them that arguably has nothing to do with the nature of the product being installed. I could include language in an EULA to require people to wear a pink tuxedo every time they chose to use my product, or agree to sign over half their life savings to me, or whatever--but I doubt it would hold up in court. I doubt this would, either, but until someone challenges it, I guess you can continue to labor under the assumption that you have complete control of your product in all circumstances.
Yes, you're right--they're not even planning on incorporating the current monorail in Seattle with the new system. If they overlap the route, the old one would be torn down and replaced; most likely, they'd pick a different route and leave the existing system intact (which is still a great way to get from downtown to Lower Queen Anne in a hurry).
The real problem with the new proposal, IMHO, is that it's a large outlay of money (really, really expensive per mile, if the latest numbers in the Times are to be believed) for an inflexible system. It's one thing to lay light rail or monorail between major urban centers (say, Seattle and Tacoma) or well-established traffic magnets (casinos) but the urban landscape changes--will the neighborhoods this is built to still be popular in twenty years? Fifty? Will downtown continue to boom or will it decentralize in that time? What about the significant portion of the population that commutes to or from the Eastside? It just seems like a very limited, inflexible, expensive plan which has great glitz value but not necessarily a lot of practical solution to it.
People who are just screwing off and not getting their job done should get axed. But over-focusing on where each minute of an employee's day goes and trying to account for every single penny of productivity is counter-productive as well. There are intangibles involved here; loyalty, effort, enthusiasm. And I've found, time and again, that companies that have happy employees who feel that they are trusted and valued get better results than companies that try to squeeze every last ounce of non-work related activity out of their zombies.
I'm at a place like that now (obviously there not very good at it, or I'd not be posting here right now). They do everything in their power to ensure that everyone knows they are here to 'work, not have fun' so they can get every possible ounce of useful work out of each of us. But if backfires, badly. I hate being here, I spend my time not being productive, but counting the minutes till I go home. I'm out the door right on time, every day. I never skip lunch. I never go that extra mile--it's been made clear that work is work, and so I make sure it doesn't impinge in the least on the rest of my life. Got a major systems problem at 4:58PM? Too bad, it'll have to wait till tomorrow.
Contrast this with the last place I was at. Man, I loved that job. We played Half-Life half the time, spent hours talking about trivia and tech, wandered in and out at random hours, and generally did a lot of things that would give more traditional business owners a heart-attack. But if there was a problem, we were all over it. I've never worked harder on anything in my life; I've never put in more hours anywhere. And I did it for a fraction of what I make where I'm at now. I would have done anything to keep that place afloat, and so would most of the rest of the staff, and consequently, we were extremely profitable. We got rid of dead wood, but having fun on the job did not necessarily equal a bad investment in someone. What it taught me is that you should be measured by what you accomplish, not how much time you spend doing it.
I left there for other reasons and I've regretted it ever since. But I see this phenomena with all sorts of different companies. The ones with happy, dedicated employees do better than the ones with mindless drones. You may be able to justify drones more easily to the accountants, but if you're really concerned about doing well, take the chance and try building a workforce that enjoys what it is doing enough to do it well and cheaply.
How about you actually take the ten seconds to click the link in his sig, read what it actually says, and then go sit somewhere quiet for a bit and feel extremely foolish?
Hehe... yeah, I just tried it and noticed that too. Either their vacancies have already been slam-filled by desperate Slashdotters, or there is a tremendous amount of irony undoubtedly going on in someone's boss' office right now.
Replace mouse wire with decoy power cord. Allow kitty to attack. Console girlfriend, enjoy future cat-free computing environment.
Sure about ownership?
on
Is MOXI Toast?
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Word on NPR this morning was that they were BOTH Vulcan funded companies. Are you sure that this is really a change in ownership, or just more of a consolidation?
Slashdot Mirror
Sorry if I was unclear--the fax is coming the other direction. They sign (physically) and fax back to us, where we sign, digitally. We can provide that back to them on disk, via FTP, or e-mail, or a host of other ways--but we're NOT trying to fax a digital signature at any point of the process.
I fully intend to have our lawyers go over this; however, I want to have a complete process to pitch at them so they can review the whole thing. If I talk to them before I have the technologies and processes lined up, they won't really be able to evaluate it properly--I could end up putting something into it later that might invalidate what they thought was kosher. So, you're right, I haven't talked to them yet--but that WILL be happening before the system goes live--just after I work out what the system is.
This is exactly what I'm not looking for--I've already dredged up all kinds of theoretical discussion of digital signatures, for and against. I want some practical advice.
Hmm... well, I suppose, but I've already got 90% of what I think I need for the system. We've had fax software for ages, and there are completely free PGP variants I can download for signing. I hate to drop coin on a huge Notes installation project, throwing the company into transition turmoil in the process, and see my break-even point in cost-benefit race away into the future.
If this were from scratch, in a completely non-wired company with no existing infrastructure, that may well be an excellent option. But I want to leverage what I have already, or it starts to not really be worth it.
Thanks!
Good point; thanks, I'll have to consider that.
It's going to be a requirement. We're in a position where we can dictate something of the sort; we already require them to check scheduling via our website, so they all have some sort of PC to work on. Additionally, provided I go with PGP or something similar, the software they will need to authenticate the signatures is free and I should be able to provide a simple guide to set it up properly.
I'm actually more worried about the larger companies we deal with (GE and the like). They are the most technologically advanced, but also the most entrenched and the least likely to bargain with us.
RE: overqualification
/. for some great examples of people vehemently arguing over completely trivial optimizations or techniques or tools. Fine for a discussion board; not something I want happening in my IT department between a sysadmin and a junior assistant underling phone monkey who used to be a sysadmin.
From my perspective, when hiring, it depends on the job. Am I going to find a programmer who is 'over-qualified' for a position? No, probably not--whatever experience they have that is over and above the requirements is cool, as long as they're willing to work the position for the pay that's offered.
But there are positions where I really want just a total drone, too--the ones where if the employee starts thinking too much, it just causes trouble. I don't need a junior level tech support guy trying to re-engineer my network. If he used to be a senior sysadmin, that's almost certainly what's going to happen. This is IT--there is no one right way to do anything. Watch
Good point--these are not mutually exclusive things. I worked my way through college doing part-time sysadmin work; when I got out, I not only had the degree but four years of real-world experience to put on my resume.
It's not always easy to find places where you can work at the flexible sort of hours required for pulling down a full course load, but it's worth looking for. Large companies with night shifts, small ones that are flexible... there are options. A big selling point I found for getting companies to allow me to work off-hours was "But it's better if I do this stuff when it won't disrupt the users, anyway."
Yeah... you don't want to be a sysadmin, anyway, if you're well-adjusted and normal.
If you're not, well, it's not something they can teach you in school, but you'll get a chance to read up on Machiavelli and other cool medieval sysadmins, so it's worth it for that if nothing else.
Well, most places, Code Three indicates an emergency response... real fast, lights and sirens, the adrenaline pumping stuff. The way he was using it didn't seem consistent, I guess... you might say "Say, dispatcher, there seems to be a green gentleman with a rocket powered flying machine in Times Square terrorizing the populace, would you be so good as to respond additional units Code Three?" but simply yelling it into the radio doesn't mean much.
As far as 'official' ten codes go, it doesn't seem to me that many agencies use them (at least out West). He could have meant 10-33, though, which simply means 'emergency' or perhaps he was off a number and meant 10-34, 'riot'. Shortly thereafter, he would likely have had a 10-7, 'out of service' (often used to call for bathroom breaks--inadvertent in this case).
I didn't say they were targetting rocks, just hitting them, and I said it because A: it was a colorful metaphor and B: because (and I'm surprised this has escaped your notice, given your obvious bias) they make mistakes. And there is a difference between dispersed targets (a lot of guys in caves) and clustered targets (a lot of guys in urban areas). And I won't even go into the different types of bombs and bombing that might be used and how that affects casualty rates, since you don't seem very interested in hearing anything that doesn't reinforce your own view of the situation.
Your assertion about Afghanistan and the press is misplaced; specifically, it should be placed in Kuwait/Iraq and moved back about ten years. There haven't been any significant restrictions on press movement in Afghanistan since this thing started, and if you leaf back through the various articles covering the last several months you would see that--all those reporters getting killed by bandits, wearing burqas to blend in to the populace, and generally spending more time filing articles about their personal safety and not about the battles--they are not there under control of anyone's military. Some of them were there before there was any real military presence. Their lack of freedom has more to do with cultural issues than any sort of control problem. I would suggest that you're so caught up in your agenda that you're taking the conditions of Kosovo and the Gulf War and imposing them here to stoke your somewhat weak arguments. However, I'm not interested in discussing the conspiracy theory of the week--I think this study, the numbers, and the implications, are intriguing, and are so without dragging any tired old over-simplified, anti-American diatribes into it. I have no interest in defending the American military's mistakes, but they just don't have anything to do with what this conversation was originally about. If you can't even be bothered to address the basic thesis (even matches=more casualties) then this is just a waste of bandwidth. Thanks for your time anyway.
Sure; not trying to say no one died, just hypothesizing that it would have been more had it been a more even match. I think you're way off on your numbers as far as equating months of bombardment with certain amounts of casualties. It has a lot more to do with targets, tonnage, and rules of engagement. If they're hitting cities (like in Iraq) I would expect it would be higher, mostly rocks (like Afghanistan) a lot lower. And the reason we don't know, of course, has much more to do with lack of a free press there than here. If you're expecting some guy speculating from the anchor desk of ABC to give you good numbers on something happening half a world away that he can't see, of course you're not going to get accuracy--which is not to say he can't make up any numbers he'd like, high or low, which sounds pretty free to me. :)
I think he's going on war being a lose/lose proposition. Why have two different magnitudes for the sides when all the dead people are... well, all dead? Total effect on humankind, or something of that sort.
Regardless, on a hunch I would say that tremendously one-sided wars are probably lower magnitude than when the sides are evenly matched. Nothing causes casualties like a slugfest where neither side is backing down. Armies that break quickly and surrender take fewer casualties than those that stand and fight it out (excepting ethnic or religious conflicts).
I'll second your recommendation of that book--I bought it on vacation at White Sands and spent most of the rest of the trip completely absorbed in it. Fascinating account of the science and the social interaction that lead up to Trinity.
It is if I pick it up at the newstand and just read page 37 and put it back.
Yeah, but with half a brain it's easy to make it look like a regular screw-up, or something that came from outside, or was just plain someone else's fault. IT workers do have a tremendous amount of power over many businesses today, and few people on either side really seem to realize it. It's worth keeping them happy, or at least not screwing them over.
I often take out a little 'insurance' if the people I am working for make me uncomfortable at all. Never done anything so far, but if someone tried to hose me badly (for example, most recently I was worried about getting canned right before annual bonuses came out--which I had stupidly agreed to count toward my desired base salary; didn't happen, fortunately, but would have been an easy way for them to get a year's worth of cheap work out of me) I wouldn't feel much compunction about returning the favor. In a world where the people with the most money hold most of the cards, I don't see a problem with using what I do hold to stay in the game.
Perhaps you just think it's coincidence that a new mayor is elected from West Seattle and all of a sudden this system goes in? Oh, no, my friend... strings have been pulled.
That Thriftway isn't even the good one--Admiral Thriftway, further North along California, would have been a much better choice. I would gain hours of my life back as if I didn't have to wait in line behind hordes of Yuppies paying for a bottle of Perrier with their debit/credit card in the 'express checkout' lane, fumbling with their PIN, receipts, etc. I suppose that using regular ol' dollar bills like the commoners would sully them horribly, but perhaps they could be trained to use this finger scanner system.
I think your definition of 'core functionality' is a little weak... this uninstalls a chunk of adware installed alongside the app, not a hunk of the code, does it not? Tell me this--does the app continue to do what it says it will do after Adaware screens it? I would guess that it does--most do, otherwise people wouldn't bother to run Adaware--no point if it actually disabled the functionality they got the app for in the first place. Your example with the TCP/IP stack binding to the adware app is presented as just that--an example. Is this something you do, or not? Are you just inventing examples to avoid the real point? And if the user doesn't need that, why would you think it is a 'core' function?
;)
I can understand you're feeling a little emotional at the moment, but unfortunately it seems to have gotten the better of you and you're reacting to what you thought I said instead of what I actually said. I never said the app performed illegally--I said the legality of the click-to-agree EULA was questionable. When you say "Check the law!" it makes it very clear that you have not done so--there is good reason to doubt this sort of EULA will hold up in court. It's not illegal, it just may not be legally binding. See Softman vs. Adobe--different circumstances, but it has some implications for your naive assertions that anything stuffed in an EULA is binding.
My suggestion would be that if the pristine state of the box your code runs on is so important to you, that you simply not release it. The fact that you have authored something just plain doesn't give you unlimited authority to dictate when and how and where and with what people use it. It's a common misconception, from corporate America on down, but it's just not true--consumers have rights, and you can't simply disregard them because they don't suit you. Unless, of course, you have Congress in your pocket.
I would say it's unethical unless there is some valid, technical reason why your program would not perform its core function properly while the other piece of software is installed. Ethically, you don't have any reason to meddle with what the user chooses to have or not have installed on his or her computer; it's simply none of your affair. If you have some political reason to not want Adaware on people's systems, fine--but that does not mean it's ethical to remove it, even if you are prompting the user. It may be ethical to simply refuse your own install unless the other piece of software is removed, but I think initiating the un-install for the other product is probably not kosher unless for valid technical reasons.
Legally is a different matter; there are plenty of things that are legal but unethical (heck, lawyers in general... nevermind) but I think the legality of this is questionable at the very least. 'Click to agree' EULAs are questionable in the first place, even before you add language to them that arguably has nothing to do with the nature of the product being installed. I could include language in an EULA to require people to wear a pink tuxedo every time they chose to use my product, or agree to sign over half their life savings to me, or whatever--but I doubt it would hold up in court. I doubt this would, either, but until someone challenges it, I guess you can continue to labor under the assumption that you have complete control of your product in all circumstances.
Yes, you're right--they're not even planning on incorporating the current monorail in Seattle with the new system. If they overlap the route, the old one would be torn down and replaced; most likely, they'd pick a different route and leave the existing system intact (which is still a great way to get from downtown to Lower Queen Anne in a hurry).
The real problem with the new proposal, IMHO, is that it's a large outlay of money (really, really expensive per mile, if the latest numbers in the Times are to be believed) for an inflexible system. It's one thing to lay light rail or monorail between major urban centers (say, Seattle and Tacoma) or well-established traffic magnets (casinos) but the urban landscape changes--will the neighborhoods this is built to still be popular in twenty years? Fifty? Will downtown continue to boom or will it decentralize in that time? What about the significant portion of the population that commutes to or from the Eastside? It just seems like a very limited, inflexible, expensive plan which has great glitz value but not necessarily a lot of practical solution to it.
People who are just screwing off and not getting their job done should get axed. But over-focusing on where each minute of an employee's day goes and trying to account for every single penny of productivity is counter-productive as well. There are intangibles involved here; loyalty, effort, enthusiasm. And I've found, time and again, that companies that have happy employees who feel that they are trusted and valued get better results than companies that try to squeeze every last ounce of non-work related activity out of their zombies.
I'm at a place like that now (obviously there not very good at it, or I'd not be posting here right now). They do everything in their power to ensure that everyone knows they are here to 'work, not have fun' so they can get every possible ounce of useful work out of each of us. But if backfires, badly. I hate being here, I spend my time not being productive, but counting the minutes till I go home. I'm out the door right on time, every day. I never skip lunch. I never go that extra mile--it's been made clear that work is work, and so I make sure it doesn't impinge in the least on the rest of my life. Got a major systems problem at 4:58PM? Too bad, it'll have to wait till tomorrow.
Contrast this with the last place I was at. Man, I loved that job. We played Half-Life half the time, spent hours talking about trivia and tech, wandered in and out at random hours, and generally did a lot of things that would give more traditional business owners a heart-attack. But if there was a problem, we were all over it. I've never worked harder on anything in my life; I've never put in more hours anywhere. And I did it for a fraction of what I make where I'm at now. I would have done anything to keep that place afloat, and so would most of the rest of the staff, and consequently, we were extremely profitable. We got rid of dead wood, but having fun on the job did not necessarily equal a bad investment in someone. What it taught me is that you should be measured by what you accomplish, not how much time you spend doing it.
I left there for other reasons and I've regretted it ever since. But I see this phenomena with all sorts of different companies. The ones with happy, dedicated employees do better than the ones with mindless drones. You may be able to justify drones more easily to the accountants, but if you're really concerned about doing well, take the chance and try building a workforce that enjoys what it is doing enough to do it well and cheaply.
How about you actually take the ten seconds to click the link in his sig, read what it actually says, and then go sit somewhere quiet for a bit and feel extremely foolish?
Hehe... yeah, I just tried it and noticed that too. Either their vacancies have already been slam-filled by desperate Slashdotters, or there is a tremendous amount of irony undoubtedly going on in someone's boss' office right now.
Replace mouse wire with decoy power cord. Allow kitty to attack. Console girlfriend, enjoy future cat-free computing environment.
Word on NPR this morning was that they were BOTH Vulcan funded companies. Are you sure that this is really a change in ownership, or just more of a consolidation?